Fear.

It settled on her face, seeping into her subconscious like doubt on prom night when the owner of the expensive pink evening gown had gained five pounds from stress eating. Keoni gripped the steering wheel tightly, speeding down I-85 as if the hounds of Hell were dogging her tracks. The late hour made driving easy as she switched lanes at the I-75 junction in mid-town, taking her exit to Preston Hills. A blue two-story modular home awaited her as she pulled her blue Ford into the drive, pressing the remote for the garage and securing it behind herself before exiting the vehicle.

Stupid.

“What was I thinking? What was I thinking?” Keoni chastised herself. It was the wrong bar. The moment she saw all the men, she knew, but the lower half of her body insisted she go inside for a drink. She’d gotten what she went inside to retrieve, but never in her wildest dreams would she have imagined herself having sex with a stranger in the middle of a crowded bar on a nasty chair as people watched, encouraged, and chanted at her as if she were a side show act. Inside of the safety of her home, she knew she should have been embarrassed but the sex was so good, she would do again on the Marta train sitting next to her Mama if the man wanted it.

Idiot.

If not for the one man who came to her rescue, she could have been the party favor for the whole biker gang. Disabling the alarm, she let herself into the three-bedroom home she shared with a grumpy cat named Sylvester and a brother who popped in when the mood struck him. At least Sylvester was happy to see her. Well, that was until she put wet food in his bowl, which he ate and then cleaned himself, which would be the end of the relationship until the morning when he required more food. Such was her life.

In her actual life, she was the Branch Manager at the library on Cleveland Avenue. The home in which she lived was purchased because it didn’t require her to take the interstate to get to work. A few side streets and the blue Ford SUV got her to work at the dingy little branch that was older than the shoes her mother wore to work in the garden.

A screaming bladder forced her to the bathroom where she relieved herself only to face a woman in the mirror she felt as if she didn’t know. “You just fucked a random stranger who wrote his number on your tits,” Keoni said to the face in the mirror.

Reddened cheeks and swollen lips from his kisses stared back at her. A powdery substance in the form of a handprint adorned the front of her dress as if the man’s hand had been in a batch of flour. The clear outline of his large hands served as a second reminder of what she’d done. Trying to sit down was the third reminder after riding Throttle as if his were the last penis in a dickless town, and last but not least, his phone number in a non-permanent marker was written across her boob. She took out her phone and snapped a photo of herself in the mirror so the number would show up in the image. Looking at it, she said the numbers aloud twice, then entered them in her phone, under the name Throttle.

“Oh dear Lawd, I screwed a man named Throttle,’ she said lowering her face from the mirror. “Shower. Wash him off of you.”

But she didn’t.

Instead, she piddled her way to the kitchen for an apple and then the remote and took a seat in her favorite chair. Queuing up the series she was binge watching, her thumb went to work as the red letters popped up on the screen against the black background. Most of the show watched her as she fell asleep in the chair, only to be awakened in the morning by Sylvester, licking her toes in an effort to coax her to feed him.

“Just like a man,” she said, struggling out of the comfy chair.

The phone chimed, startling her, and both she and Sylvester nearly jumped a mile in the air. Cursing under her breath, she answered the disturber of her peace.

“Hello,” Keoni said into the line.

“Good morning, gorgeous, don’t forget you are meeting me for lunch at The Pavilion with two potential new clients,” Carlton said cheerily. This was the usual call for her to be a plus one in a designer dress, high heels and a plastered on smile.

“I’m not feeling well today, Carlton, I’m sorry,” she said.

“Do I need to bring you some soup or pain relievers?”

“No, I went to that lady biker thing yesterday and drinks afterwards,” she said. “I guess I had too much sun, too many drinks, and not enough food. After I hydrate and sleep a bit, I will be right as rain.”

“Lady bikers?” he chuffed in disapproval. “If you ask me, those types of clubs are for people with loose morals who like to get together to have random sex with shady people, or as my daddy calls it, getting some strange. You can’t get much stranger than those people. My girl doesn’t need to be seen with that lot.”

“Your girl?”

“Yes, Keoni. I plan to marry you,” Carlton said.

She exhaled loudly into the phone. He often brought up the subject, dangling it like a carrot in front of a non-caring jackass with no appetite for drama. She never bit at the supposed treat. It bored her. The idea of being his wife bored her even more, coupled with the fact that she couldn’t get a nut with that squirrel even when she climbed the tree.

“Carlton, I’m not your girl. We are friends. You are my plus one and I’m yours,” she clarified. “We haven’t had sex in five months. That officially makes us platonic friends.”

“You and your labels,” Carlton said, terminating her dismissal of their relationship. “Sure, you can’t make it today? I’m meeting with that hot new rapper with the song everyone is dancing to…you know the challenges.”

“Today, Carlton, sitting upright is my biggest challenge, so please, listen to what I’m saying,” she pleaded.

“I hear you,” he said, clearing his throat for his second charge at the barrier she refused to allow the man to cross again.

“But you aren’t listening,” she said. “I’m not marrying you and I can’t make it today.”

“Gotcha,” Carlton replied. “However, don’t forget next month is my Aunt Raina’s birthday bash. All the family will be there, and you’re my plus one.”

“I have it on my calendar,” she told him. “Are you picking me up or are we meeting there?”

“I’m picking you up,” he said. “Bye for now.”

“Bye, Carlton,” she said, pressing the end button on the call. She wished she could press the end button on him being in her life, but that wasn’t about to happen. The man was like a toenail fungus you hide with brightly colored nail polish. It was always there; you just hid it from the eyes of company. As many times as she tried to treat the miscreant invader engorging itself on her big toe, it just seemed to grow and yellow the nail. Carlton Gear was yellowing her soul.

Liar.

In many ways she wanted to blame last night on him. The constant battle with boredom was why she stayed in the bar even after realizing it was the wrong location. Carlton’s inability to get her off was why she spent the better part of fifteen minutes riding a stranger like the bull at a western bar. She wasn’t seated on the back of the bike, but Throttle had made her his bitch.

The shower called to her as the faint scent of his cologne clung to her skin like a reminder of his mouth on her skin, recapping that last night she comported herself like a whore. A bawdy wench in a tavern making a few extra shillings to buy a loaf of bread for the wee babes who waited for her at home.

Throttle said to call him in a day or two. She would wait four days then call him. Well, maybe three. Even if she acted like a whore, she wasn’t a desperate one.

Throttle spent the better part of the weekend working on his bar. As a honorary member of the Easy Low Riders, he didn’t partake in many of the activities. The Bitch Rides on Friday nights were not his thing, but he’d seen the woman walking into his bar, thinking she was out of place. One thing he knew for sure, Big Jock was no longer welcome in the Clubhouse. If a couple were into that public display kind of thing, it was cool, but a random woman, not understanding the culture of the Club, was a new tomato in the bunch of cucumbers and eggplant diets. Yet, she acted as if she knew.

As if she understood.

The way she led him to the chair.

Unfastening his pants.

Having a rubber on the ready and putting it on him.

“She put it on me real good,” he mumbled to himself and going over the books to check his sales receipts. They would have to be reviewed by his accountant, but thus far, the bar was in the black, he had a nest egg, and life was looking good. However, he couldn’t get his mind off Hot Stuff. He hoped she’d call. Seeing her again would be nice, and getting to know the real her entered his head. Then he shuddered. Many of the women who came to the bar showed the true-life versions of themselves, which was why he was still single. A good time here and there was okay in his book, but he wanted something real. Dismissing the hot little low rider who left with his number scrawled across her right tit, Throttle set back to work. Saturday faded into Sunday and the weekend had come and gone without a hitch.

By the time Monday rolled around, The Clubhouse was quiet and he could get away for a day or so. This weekend, he planned a ride out to the lake to breathe in a bit of fresh air, catch some fish, and get back to nature. Hot Stuff entered his thoughts again.

“Naw,” he thought. The expensive dress. The pretty high heels. A lady like that wouldn’t want to spend the night sleeping in a tent on the ground. She would want to spend the weekend at The Ritz with room service and a spa day. Either way, he hoped she would call.

“I bet she does something weird for a living like working at the zoo or some shit,” he said aloud chuckling.

“You okay in there, Boss?” Randy, his Bar Manager called out.

“Yep, just going over a few things,” Throttle answered back. “Hey, don’t forget, I’m gone this weekend. You have the helm.”

“Are you taking that hot little number with you, too?”

“Oh, Keoni,” he said.

“That’s her name!” Randy said with his eyebrows arched. “For a second there, I didn’t think you knew her. I figured she decided on you versus the crew.”

He’d hit it on the head with a very large hammer, but Throttle didn’t need him to know that or anything else about his private life.

“Yeah, we are working it out,” Throttle lied.

“She worked you out on that chair,” Randy said with a grin. “I hate Friday night Bitch Rides, but that one was hot! Sorry. But it was.”

“That’s just creepy,” Throttle said.

“Just saying we are getting requests for her to come back and you two go at it again. I’d put five on it,” Randy confessed.

“And you are a chronic gambler,” he told the barkeep. “You’d put five on your Granny racing in a wheelchair.”

“She’d win, too! Have you met my Grandma?”

“Go! Get out of my office,” Throttle said with a smile. “I have work to do before I get out of here.”

Randy left the Manager’s Office as Throttle reached for his phone. Chastising himself for not getting her number, he scrolled through the calls and texts, hoping to find a random set of digits. Thus far, only a call from his accountant, his mother, his sister, and his knuckleheaded little brother. He didn’t feel like talking to any of them. He wanted to talk to her.

Know more about her.

Spend an evening looking into those intense brown eyes.

Holding her.

Doubt.

It crept up on him like a bad habit and took a seat in the chair next to him, gawking, reminding Throttle that it was a fluke. A random act and she would never call. He shook off the doldrums threatening to steal the joy of the day and began clipping the receipts together to drop off at the accountant’s office.

Doubt.

It sat on the shelf in the new fiction section, it’s spine to her face, a shiny red sticker sitting above the call number with a label that read “Best Seller.” Doubt was also her companion as she checked her watch. It beeped twice, showing a smiley face that encouraged her to move. That was the last thing she needed in her life was a judgmental watch, but it was right. The time had come to make a move.

In the privacy of her office, she picked up her phone. Her palms were sweaty as she pressed the keypad and dialed the number the man had given her. In her heart, she hoped it was the wrong number but her panties wanted otherwise. She listened to the rings, ready to hang up after the third one, but the line came to life. A deep, sexy voice spoke into the phone.

“Easy Low Riders Bar and Grille,” the voice said.

“Hey there, Throttle,” she said.

“Is that you, Hot Stuff?” he asked, sitting rigid in the chair.

“It’s me,” she said.

He chewed on his bottom lip, not knowing what to say. Throttle knew what he should say, but he didn’t think it would work. Life was too short for games and he didn’t want to play any with this woman.

“Kinda got worried you wouldn’t call, real glad you did,” he said.

“So, I’m on the line, what’s your next move?”

“Don’t know, to be honest,” he said. “For some reason, you don’t strike me as the kind of girl that would go for dinner and a movie. I do want to have dinner with you. Talk. Get to know you.”

“You’re right,” she said, feeling more confident than she had in years. “I’m not a girl. I thought I showed you that.”

“You showed me real good, Hot Stuff,” he said, biting back the desire to ask if she was calling for another ride. Instead he went with, “I know you eat. How about it? Me. You. Food. Table.”

“When?”

“Tomorrow night. You pick the place and I’ll be there on time,” he said.

“The Vortex on Northeast Peachtree, 8 o’clock,” she offered.

He liked her style. A biker themed bar. No fancy table cloths or six sets of silverware. Good burgers. Great beers and a chance to stare into those intense eyes. His shit got rock hard just thinking about looking at her again.

“I know the place. See you then,” he said, hanging up. He had her number now as well. Just to make sure, he dialed her back.

Keoni answered on the second ring.

“Hey, Hot Stuff, wear something sexy so I can be reminded how lucky I am,” he said.

“I can do that,” she said with a smile.

“Yeah, you can,” he said, hanging up again.

In two different parts of town, two hearts beat in unison. Neither understood what was happening, yet neither dared to question the chance meeting, the amazing connection, and the opportunity to connect again. The expectations were low on both scales, and if all else failed, a good burger would be gotten out of the deal and the weight of aloneness would be abated.

It was enough for now.